


Move Me

by Jadis



Series: Never Come Home [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, M/M, Post Reichenbach - AU after S3 Premieres
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-20
Updated: 2013-05-20
Packaged: 2017-12-12 11:42:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/811206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jadis/pseuds/Jadis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stunned and hurt to find Sherlock was still alive, John follows through with his commitment to Mary. As time passes he finds that the consequences of his actions aren't as easy to live with as he might have believed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**_“I'd never let her know, [but] there's a place inside of me that just won't let you go”_ **

**_– Dan Seals_ **

The sounds of utensils & wine glasses clinking and the aroma of garlic followed John and Mary out the door of the rather high end Italian restaurant.  John had his arm around Mary’s waist, nipping at her ear as he whispered all the filthy things he planned to do to her once they were back at their flat. 

“I’d be more apt to believe you, Dr. Watson,” she said, mock pulling away from him.  “If we hadn’t murdered that gorgeous Bordeaux and then you ordered Irish coffee and tiramisu.”

“Are you questioning my stamina, Ms. Morstan?” he asked, in mock outrage.

“I’m questioning your priorities,” she said, looking at him through fluttering eyelashes.  “I hear you’re going to be an old married man soon.”  She leaned in and whispered.  “And I hear _sex_ is the first thing to go.”

 “John.” 

He’d frozen.  It couldn’t be.  That voice. That very _dead_ voice.

He’d turned and there he was.  Sherlock.

“No,” he’d murmured, head swimming, but now it wasn’t from the bottle of Bordeaux nor the whiskey.  “No,” he said again.  He couldn’t even hear his own voice, unsure if he’d spoken aloud or not.  There was no sensory input getting through now, only the thrumming of his blood. 

And Sherlock.  Sherlock saying his name.

He felt Mary tug his elbow but he was transfixed.  As if she were underwater, John heard her voice, “Oh my God.  Is that?  Is that – Sherlock?”

“John,” Sherlock said again, his voice crystal clear, the sounds of the busy London Street faded to silence.

Gutted. That is how he felt. Gutted. Again.

John moved like lightening.  The crunch of bone as his fist connected with Sherlock’s jaw felt fantastic. And then he’d thrown another.  And another. 

It was Mary’s horrified “STOP IT!” that finally broke through the red haze covering his eyes.

Sherlock hadn’t tried to hit him back nor had he flinched from the blows. 

He did try to speak but John, doubled over trying to keep from emptying his stomach, raising a warning hand, cutting him off.  “I don’t give a damn what your excuse is.” He rasped.  “Stay away from me.” 

With trembling legs, John stumbled away.  He’d only gotten a few strides before he realized Mary wasn’t with him.  “Mary!” he called.  “Come on.”

He clamped his jaws closed when he heard her apologizing to Sherlock.  “I’m sure he’ll change his mind,” she said.  “I’m so sorry.”

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

Mary had iced his hand down with a bag of frozen veg when they got back to the flat and asked if he wanted to talk about it.

He did not.

She fixed him a cuppa, kissed the top of his head, told him she loved him.  But John saw concern on her face, worry: the little “elevens’ lines between her eyes that he hated putting there.  It was the first time she had ever seen the brutality he was capable of and John damned himself for losing his temper.  But given the stimulus, he decided the collateral damage could have been much, much worse.

The bloody bastard!  How dare he? There was nothing in the world that would ever make up for the living hell John had gone through. The absolute _wanker_.

John had somehow managed to get through the next 24 hours.  He still couldn’t talk about it.  He didn’t know if he’d ever be able to.   Mary didn’t ask and he was dead grateful.   ‘ _unfortunate word choice_ ,’ his subconscious mocked.

After his second night of no sleep, John stumbled down the stairs, eyes bloodshot and movements clumsy, as if he didn’t really have control over his own limbs.

Mary met him at the door into the kitchen and handed him a cup of tea.  “You’re going to want to sit down,” she said, reaching up and brushing his fringe into place.

“Yeah?” he asked.  He sat hard in the chair.  “What is it? Is he dead again?”  Even he flinched at the bitterness in his voice.

He looked up at her and hated the pity he saw in her face.  She’d never looked at him like that, not after those first six months they’d been together. 

Mary had saved him.  Of course she’d known who he was when they met.  Who in London didn’t?  The scandal of Sherlock’s suicide had taken on a life of its own as Lestrade had worked tirelessly to prove Moriarty was real and that Richard Brooks was the fiction.

What had any of it mattered, John had wondered at the time.  It wouldn’t bring Sherlock back.  Death was forever.

Except when it wasn’t.

She sat the Daily Mail in front of him.  Screaming from the headlines were “Sherlock Holmes Returns”

John’s tea grew cold as he read how Sherlock had faked his death in order to save those closest to him.  He’d spent the better part of the last three years hunting down the final assassin: the one trained on his previous flat mate and blogger: John Watson. 

The last paragraph made John wince.  Obviously the CCTV footage of his pummeling Sherlock had not come to light.  Yet.

_“Sources say that Dr. Watson left London after his colleague’s ‘suicide.’  Rumour has it Dr. Watson will be hanging up his ‘confirmed bachelor’ title, exchanging nuptials at a country wedding in coming days.  A source who requested to remain anonymous said they assumed Mr. Holmes would be there to stand up as his best friend’s best man on that big day.”_

John called into the surgery and took a sick day.

Mary wisely gave him space.  When she called out she was leaving for the day and he heard the door click closed, he let go of a shuddering breath he hadn’t known he was holding.

The bastard had done it all for him.  Which would make the first selfless thing he’d ever known Sherlock Holmes to do.

It wasn’t long before his mobile began ringing.  John shut it off.

Somehow his grief was even worse now.  It was loss compounded by betrayal.

He didn’t know what to do.  He was caught in the morass of his warring feelings at the very time where he should be blissfully happy helping Mary manage the burgeoning ‘last minute details’ of their wedding.   John wished for nothing more than to be somewhere else, anywhere else.  And he hated himself for it.

As it was, he was barely managing to make it through the days at the surgery.  At night he only paid lip service to any question Mary asked him about the flowers, the last minute changes to the seating arrangements for dinner, or questions about who had what food allergies and how they were to accommodate them all.

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

He’d been jerked out of a reverie one evening, sitting with a cold mug of tea in his hands, staring unseeingly at the telly.

“John!” Mary had frown lines around her mouth.

“Sorry what?”

“I asked if you were still planning to arrive at the wedding in Cinderella’s carriage?”

Blinking, John tried to parse what she’d just said.  “I’m sorry, Mary.  I don’t follow.”

She’d sighed.  “Darling, I know how important Sherlock was to you.  You should call him.  Ask him to stand up as your best man.”

“I can’t, I’ve already – ”

She cut him off.  “Donnie won’t mind. In fact, he already called me – said you wouldn’t answer your mobile – he thinks it should be Sherlock as well.”

“I was Donnie’s best man,” John said, stubbornly clinging to the promise he and his roommate made to one another out of uni.  “He was the first to marry and we swore he’d be my best man when my time came.”

“But, Donnie _doesn’t_ mind,” Mary pressed.

John closed his eyes, taking as deep a breath as he could in an effort to remain calm.

 “You’ll regret it if you don’t, John,” she said.

God knew he’d learned to trust her judgment over his own during the two and a half years they’d been together.

The next day John called a number he’d hoped to never use again. 

“He’ll be there,” the silky slightly condescending voice said in lieu of a greeting.  “The morning suit is ready for a final fitting.”

“I need to talk to him,” John said.

“I’m not sure that is the wisest course of action, John.”  Mycroft paused for a fraction of a second too long.  “You’ve made your position quite clear.”

“Oh yeah?  Then why the hell am I calling you and why would I want him to be my Best Man?”

“The public eye, of course,” Mycroft said.  “There are fictions to be maintained, are there not?”

“I don’t know what _the hell_ you’re on about,” John said.

“John, I know the media has been full of the triumphant return of my brother.  But there are many, many things he’s lived through that the public will never know.”  Mycroft paused.  “Let’s close this chapter on a positive note, shall we?”

“Is he alright?” John asked.  He felt his self-righteous indignation slipping and berated himself.

“He will be,” Mycroft said.  “In time.”

“What does that mean?” John demanded.

“I’ll deliver him to the wedding.”  The line disconnected.

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

Only just.

The music had started and most of the guests were seated before Sherlock slipped in through a crack in the huge white tent and stood silently at John’s right hand.

The air seemed to electrify as guests murmured the arrival of his personal Lazarus.  Except he wasn’t John’s personal anything anymore.  

John turned to look at him but could only meet his eyes for a moment.  Sherlock’s eyes, once bright with curiosity and mischief were hooded; his face completely devoid of emotion.  Yet John could see hollows under his eyes that didn’t used to be there.

Unable to speak, John cleared his throat and then let his eyes drop to the green grass at their feet.  He had questions and wanted to understand why Sherlock had done what he did but today wasn’t the day for that. 

The music signaling the bride’s entrance began and John turned and focused on Mary. 

John remembered how ironic it seemed when she had joined him at the makeshift altar:  he was standing between the two people he had credited for saving his life.  And while he tried not to, he found himself glancing over to the man who’d been dead to him for longer than he’d actually known him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

 

**Two Years Later:**

Unfortunately, Mary had been right.  Sex had been the first thing to go.

John blamed it on his age or on the mind-numbing boredom he sometimes felt being away from London.  He blamed it on the long hours at the practice and Mary’s exhaustion at the end of each day after dealing with children and their parents.

At first he’d railed against the loss.  He might be well over forty, closer to that next major birthday, truth be told, but still: there were now drugs for flagging libidos.  But neither of them seemed fussed enough to discuss it.  Until finally, it was something that just ‘was’ between them.  ‘ _or not’_ his subconscious supplied, in a  liquid velvet tone

They’d moved into a semi-detached six months after they’d married but given the perpetual state of ‘organized chaos’ as Mary liked to call it; it looked to John as if they’d lived there for a lifetime.

Mary had a hard time with paper.  It flummoxed her.  John had suggested that she only touch it once: one and done.  She hadn’t taken kindly to the ‘help’. 

Since then he’d learned to manage most of the post as it came into the house, whittling it down to bills and other necessities to reduce the sheer volume of what made it into the metal tray that he’d designated as the place to keep such things. He binned the rest.

She tried, very hard. After living with the controlled – or even not so controlled – chaos at 221B, John craved a less cluttered environment.  Nonetheless, books, CDs, DVDs and the like often found themselves piling up in the sitting room.

So on a rainy Sunday afternoon, Mary out with some friends she’d known from uni, John decided to pick up a bit and began re-shelving the various bits and bobs that had ‘wandered’ away from their respective homes, but had yet to find a place in their new one.

When he got to the CDs, he sighed to see that – once again – his carefully alphabetized system had been gutted.  He hung his head and sighed, settling in for a bit of a re-org.

 _‘why was a concept of a clean home so difficult?’_ He bit down on the note of irritation sounding in his head.  It was just a little bit of organizing.  Nothing to get riled up about.

Finishing the CDs, John reached for the pile of DVDs and then hung his head, sighing.  A nice cup of tea would be in order first.  He tucked the DVD’s in the crook of his arm and headed for the kitchen.

As he waited for the kettle to boil John looked at the stack of DVDs.   A couple of Rom-Coms, two Marvel adaptations, a period piece and….his hand stilled over the last one.  It was the professional edit of their wedding, a gift from Mary’s mother, as was most of the wedding, actually. 

He smiled, could it really have been two years ago?  Where had the time gone?  He looked around the kitchen.  There was a pile of tea towels, a half empty jar of Branston Pickle, HP Brown Sauce, a can of beans and aluminum roll cluttering the cabinet.

 Maybe it was serendipitous he’d found the DVD.  It wouldn’t be a bad thing to remember how he’d felt that day. 

The kettle kicked off, and John poured the hot water over the tea bag in his mug, and began putting away the various items into their tiny pantry.

Grabbing the DVDs he moved back to the sitting room and reshelved them as well.

By the time his tea was ready for a splash of milk, he’d cued up the wedding DVD on his laptop.  He’d never even watched it.  He hadn’t known Mary had either, but obviously it was out so she must have done.

He watched the day unfold, Mary getting ready, her attendants helping with the crinoline.  Her hair and makeup already done up by a stylist – another gift from her mum.

The scene changed and he watched himself getting spiffed up, much less fuss, but still.  He remembered the butterflies in his stomach.  Not all of them related to getting married.

John took a drink of tea as memories clamoured for his attention: his love for Mary, happiness at seeing all their friends and family gathered to wish them the best for their upcoming lives together. 

John closed his eyes.  It had been a very long time since he’d consciously thought about that day and about Sherlock.

Sherlock had come and gone so silently, no words exchanged between them. He hadn’t even bothered to say, “Congratulations.” Donnie had ended up giving the best man’s toast at the dinner.  John had been relieved and hurt in almost equal proportions. 

John watched himself step up to the altar, the guests taking notice, his appearance letting them know the proceedings were beginning. 

Then Sherlock stepped up next to him. Even the videographer, it seemed, had known to capture the moment.  The camera zoomed in and John watched as he acknowledged Sherlock.  He saw worry in the lay of his own mouth.  He remembered thinking he was grateful the bruising from the punches he’d landed were faded. 

When the bridal march began, John had swung away from Sherlock and watched as his beautiful bride approached, on the arm of her beloved dad.

John watched as the minister went through the motions of welcoming of the guests, the first reading Mary had chosen and talked about the sanctity of marriage.

The minister asked if there was anyone who knew of a reason he and Mary shouldn’t be married when the camera did a funny wobble, zooming over to Sherlock.  John furrowed his brows as he watched, only to have his jaw drop. Because there - for all the world to see - was an expression he’d never before seen on Sherlock’s face. But it – whatever _it_ was – was wiped away so fast John wondered if he’d imagined it. 

Hitting the pause, John used his mouse to drag it back a bit.  There it was again. 

“Jesus,” he said.  He sat back hard in the dining room chair.  He watched it again.  Sherlock’s eyes were locked on the back of John’s head.  As the minister spoke, asking if anyone had a reason they shouldn’t marry, Sherlock’s face crumpled and he swallowed.  John hit pause.  There, for anyone to see, was pain.  Longing.  Desire.  And within in a microsecond, it was gone.

“That’s impossible,” he said aloud.  “Impossible.”  Abruptly he pushed back from the table, pacing a couple of steps, but never far enough he couldn’t see what was written all over Sherlock’s face.  He needed to understand what it meant.  He looked back at the slightly grainy picture of the man he’d once considered the best friend he’d ever had.  To the man whose supposed death had threatened to break John like the Gulf War had never been able to.

John cursed. Trying to ignore the fact that his hand was trembling for the first time in three years, he reached down to turn the recording back on.

Now his search was for something else.  He sped through the bits where Sherlock didn’t appear, and then stopped them and went frame-by-frame looking for anything that would give him more information about how his friend had felt.

 _‘friend’_ his self-conscious mocked.  ‘ _this is how you treat a ‘friend’?’_

He hadn’t sought Sherlock out after the wedding.  He was so caught up in his life with Mary that the days turned into weeks and into months.  Little by little, daily life took over and before John knew it, he and Mary had slipped into domesticity. 

  _‘dull’_ the voice in his head said. 

~~ooOoo~~

 

A bell above the door rang harshly, caught by the same brutal wind John was glad to leave behind.  He shivered, hovering at the threshold, taking just a moment to get his breath back and inhale the heady smell of strong coffee and chai tea.

“John!”

He turned to see Mike Stamford waving him over.  They clasped hands in a friendly shake, and John said, “I’ll get the coffee.  What would you like?”

Within a few minutes he was back with two To Go Cups, and John had to swallow over the emotion in his throat.  The memory of how close he’d been to suicide that day he’d bumped into Mike all those years ago sat like a rock in his stomach.

“Can you believe it’s been over two years since we saw each other?” Mike said. 

“Yes,” John said as he pulled back the wooden ladder backed chair.  “Yes I can.”

“How’s married life treating you?”  Mike asked before taking a sip of his cappuccino.

“It’s uhm…its good,” John said.  “And you?” he nodded to Mike.  “How’ve you been keeping?”

“Good,” Mike said.  “How’s the Missus?”

“She’s good,” John, said, rolling the cup around in his hands, looking at the tabletop.  “We’re good.  Moved out to Chelmsford.”

“Yeah, I’d heard that,” Mike said.  “Nice and quiet out there then?”

“Yes,” John said.  “Very quiet.”

“Well,” Mike said, “Like I said before, remember?  That day I ran into you right after you’d come home?”

John nodded, “I remember.” He clutched his paper cut tighter and hoped it wouldn’t crumple.

“I can’t imagine you not in London.”

John looked up, catching the question he saw in on Mike’s face, even though he didn’t ask it.  “Well,” he looked away.  “That’s not me anymore.”

Mike seemed resigned.

“How’s Molly?” John asked, swallowing down a bitter feeling, still angry at her role in the farce of Sherlock’s death.

“Good,” Mike said.  “She’s good.”

“Good,” John said.

The sat in silence for a moment and John felt the bile in his throat as he choked down another mouthful of coffee.  He’d been fighting himself for over two weeks, but he had to know.  “So, you run in Sherlock much? Over at St. Bart’s I mean?”  He hazarded a quick glance up and then did a double take he took in the surprise and confusion on Mike’s face.  “What?”

“I – uh,” Mike began and then stopped, cocking his head to the right.  “John –”

“What is it?” John’s heart sped up. “Is he okay?  What’s happened?”

Mike put his hands up in a ‘slow down’ sort of move.  “No, John.  He’s fine.  I mean I guess he is.”

“What does that mean?” John asked.  The sides of the coffee cup began to give and he slid the fragile cup away from him.

“He moved to the continent,” Mike said, his eyes full of concern.  “Didn’t you know?”

John silently shook his head. 

“Yes.  Right after you got married,” Mike said.  “Or that’s at least what I heard from Molly.”

Squaring his shoulders John sat back in the chair and cleared his throat.  “Right.”  And he couldn’t help it, God help him he couldn’t keep the desperation out of his eyes.  “And you don’t know if he’s okay?  How to contact him?”

Mike’s face grew more concerned, “Is everything quite alright?  You’re not?” he stopped and eyed John, this time detaching and begin a clinical scan.  “You’re not ill or anything?”

“No,” John hurried to say.  “No, nothing like that.”

“I don’t know how to contact him, and I don’t think Molls has heard from him either,” Mike said.  “I’d think your best bet would be his brother.”

That would never happen.

“What about your ex-land lady?” Mike asked.  “Molls said Sherlock was always sweet on her.  Perhaps she has contact details.”

John nodded, swallowing hard.  “Okay,” he said.

“Did you two have a falling out?” Mike asked curiosity on his face,  “When he came back, I mean.”

John looked away.  When he looked back he saw Mike register the moisture in his eyes.  “He was my best man,” he said.

Mike nodded, and then reached into his pocket and pulled out a portable flash drive.  “Speaking of,” he handed it over to John.  “I looked at these as I copied them over for you.”

John took the drive, frustrated when his hand trembled ever so slightly.  “Oh yeah?”

Mike smiled, “This was before Molls and me, you know.” He shook his head.  “She must have come way down to have settled for me, yeah?”

John started to be protest but Mike stopped him. 

“No,” Mike interrupted.  “The thing is: there are very few pictures of you and Mary on this drive.  The bulk of them are Sherlock.”  He gave a little self-deprecating cough.  “Not that I blame her.  I don’t know if she ever got over him, you know?”

Blinking rapidly, John said, “Yeah, I know.  He’s not easy to get over, is he?”

Now it was Mike’s turn to do a double take.  “John?”

John shook his head.  “No, no,” he said. “I – we – never.”  He reached for the coffee again; stone cold, but he drank it anyway.  “I…uh…”  John had to get out of there.  He slid his chair back and tilted the USB drive toward Mike.  “Thanks for this,” he said.  “I’m sorry, Mike, but I’ve got to go.”

Mike stood and moved around the table quicker than John would have given him credit for.  “John: if you want to talk about it, I’m here.”  He smiled.  “I’ve heard it all before.  Like you said, he’s hard to get over.” he said.  “Do you understand?”

John swallowed against a ball of emotion in his throat and clapped a hand on Mike’s shoulder, pulling him into a manly half-hug.  “Thanks, Mike.”  Then he turned and walked out into the howling wind where raindrops were just beginning to fall.

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

John waited until Mary had gone up for the night.  She’d given him a quick buss, and they’d exchanged ‘I love yous’.  John watched her until she disappeared up the stairs, before he booted up his laptop.  He settled down onto the chintz couch, a freshly brewed cuppa at his right hand.

Slipping the USB drive out of the pocket of his jeans, he inserted it into the appropriate slot in his laptop, did a quick security scan, and then clicked to open the folder containing photos.

As the pictures popped up on the screen, he saw the dark curly locks.  Mike wasn’t half joking.  There were a lot of pictures of Sherlock.  Since he hadn’t been there that long, Molly must have not watched the ceremony at all.

But, God bless her, she had the shots he wanted to see: slides 19 through 23.

Knowing he had them, he continued moving through Molly’s shots.  He stopped on image 43.  In this one, she’d caught a picture where half of John’s face showed, looking back at Sherlock.

_When had that happened?_

Image 64 also showed him also eyes locked with Sherlock. 

_What the hell?_

Christ.  That didn’t happen.  How could it have?  He’d been saying his vows to Mary for God’s sake.

John ran his fingers through his hair, making it stand on end.  He never thought he’d say this but: he needed more data.  And he needed to be able to compare the still shots with the video. 

The DVD was still in his laptop and he started it again, now quickly moving past the opening sequences and straight into the moment that Sherlock stepped into the scene.  The angle wasn’t quite the same, of course, the videographer having had a freer rein than a guest such as Molly, who ostensibly been seated throughout the entire ceremony.

Matching up the ‘look’ he’d seen on the DVD and finding it in position 19 of Molly’s photos, he restarted the recording.  And there!  He saw it.  He hit ‘pause’.

For Christ’s sake’s he truly had turned his head to look at Sherlock.

But why?  What had happened? 

Backing it up 10 seconds at a time, he studied Sherlock’s face.  Nothing.  The cool mask of impassivity remained firmly in place.

Until it didn’t.

But it appeared to have occurred because John looked at him.

John had kept the sound off, but now he wanted to know if there had been a noise, prompting him to look at Sherlock.

Setting the laptop aside, he leaned over and picked up his satchel he took back and forth to work and quickly located his ear buds. 

He plugged them into the laptop as he resettled on the couch.   He turned on the sound and hit play, listening for something that might account for it.  There was no noise.  Nothing but the slight sound of the guests rustling in their seats, and the minister going through their vows. 

And then John looking over his shoulder at Sherlock.

John stopped the playback, backed it up and then played it again; this time he listened for what the minister was saying.

What he heard stopped him dead:

_John, will you take Mary to be  your wife?_

_Will you love her, comfort her, honour and protect her,_  

_and, forsaking all others,_   _be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?_  
  
---  
  
 

‘ _what was it_?’ John’s inner voice whispered inside his head.  ‘ _was it the forsaking all others’?_

“Well that would be a damned sight better than questioning the ‘faithful’ part,” John mumbled under his breath.

But was it?  Was it really?

He ran it back and watched again.  In reality it had happened so fast John didn’t think he’d have ever noticed it without having Molly’s stills.  Obviously he’d had no conscious memory of it even that day.

Flipping back to look at the last image of interest, 64, he used the same methodology he had on the previous picture.  Again, no external noise appeared to have caused him to look over his shoulder.  Almost dreading what the minister was saying at exactly that moment, John held his breath as he listened.

It was during the Marriage Blessing:

 

  _Bless them in their work and in their companionship_

He sighed.  At least this one made more sense.  Sherlock’s face was in the shadows in the photo that Molly had taken, but there was still pain there.  Sherlock’s face, so often wiped free of emotion had an amazing capacity to telegraph them in glorious detail, leaving little to the imagination if he so chose to let you in.  This picture was no different.

John closed down his laptop.  But the haunted eyes of his once best friend seemed burned in his head.  It was too much.  Just too much for one day.  Things would look brighter in the morning.  They always did.

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

For the next three nights, after Mary had gone to bed, John went back through the stills and the recording.  It just wasn’t possible, what he thought he saw there.  And even if it were, that was two years ago.

Dear God, he hated to sound like a broken record, but for the final time: he wasn’t gay.  He was married.  To a woman.  He’d never ever so much as participated in hand jobs with other blokes in the Army.

_‘but the thought occurred with your madman of a flat mate, did it not?’_

John would be lying if he said he never felt electricity between them.  But he always put it down to adrenalin after a thrilling conclusion to a case.  Sometimes they’d turn toward one another and be standing a bit too close, breathing into each other’s mouth.

But never any other time.  Never once.

John slammed the lid down on his computer and then started to see Mary standing in the doorway, casually leaning against the doorjamb.

“Everything alright?” she asked.

John forced a smile. “Of course, love. What would be wrong?”

“You’re watching our wedding DVD,” she said, a question in her eyes.

“I, well, yes I was.”

“Like what you see?” Mary moved further into the room and sat down on the couch next to John.

“Well,” John began, turning so he could see her.  “Of course.  It is good to see us on that happy day.”  She was lovely.  Even in soft cotton jim-jams, hardly sexy by most men’s imagination, but John felt his heartbeat speed up a bit and pretended it was due to love, and not guilt at being caught thinking of someone else. 

‘ _be faithful to her…_ ’ thrummed the silky baritone in his head.

“Anything else?” she asked.

“What else should there be?” he countered.

“I ran into Molly Hooper this week.”

John stiffened.

“She asked what I thought of the wedding pictures Mike had given you.”

“I….yes.” John took a deep breath and then spoke in a rush.  “I’d asked Mike to get me whatever pictures he had.  I – uh – I found the DVD when you were out a few weeks ago, and I watched it.”  He smiled.  “I wanted to see other pictures then.”

“You haven’t talked to Mike in two years, have you?”

Carefully he kept the smile pinned on his face.  “Long overdue then.”

She reached out and touched his arm.  “This is about Sherlock, isn’t it?”

John suddenly became aware of the wind up clock on the mantle, it’s ticking immeasurably loud.  He swallowed.  “Why would you ask that?”

“Oh darling,” she said, scooting closer.  “He was so in love with you.”

John jumped as if scalded.  “Oh Christ!  Not you too.  How could you possibly know that?  You met him once and then he stood up at the wedding, barely saying a word either time.”

“Words weren’t necessary,” she said.  And she had that horrible pitying look on her face again.  “I could see it all over him.”

John didn’t know what to think. ‘ _you see but you do not observe’_ wafted through his mind.

He looked away, staring at a point far away, lost in time.  “How could he be?  He hadn’t seen me in years.  I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know, John.” Mary’s tone was tight.  “But you haven’t spoken to him since, have you?” The question sounded a bit like an accusation, a bit like fear.

John looked up and saw both emotions in her face and sighed.  “No,” he said, going for reassurance but it sounded more like defeat.  “No, I haven’t spoken to him.”

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

John settled into his pre-booked seat, grateful when the other three seats didn’t fill up.  The Eurostar was ready to go and he heard the pneumatic sounds as the doors closed and sealed.

Mary had become distant after their talk about Sherlock and the wedding pictures.  Like everyone else in the entire world, it seemed, she believed he had unresolved feelings for his ex-flatmate.  From John’s perspective he’d had never done or said anything to make her think that.  Mary had saved his life when Sherlock ‘died’.  She’d helped him put his life back together.  There was no reason for her to believe he had unresolved ‘anything’ for Sherlock.

Yet it put an additional chill on their marriage, making them both more likely to snipe about toilet seats not closed, and drips of toothpaste left to dry in the sink, socks just missing the clothes bin and clean clothes piling up near the washer/dryer needing to be hung or folded.

He’d met Mike for coffee another time after getting the photos off him.  Over their first cup, he’d opened up and told Mike what he saw in the pictures.

 “You should look him up,” Mike had said.  “I asked Molls and she thinks he’s in France.”

“Look him up how?”

“Well – the internet, I suppose,” Mike said.

“Tried it,” John said quickly.  “No luck.”

“His brother?” Mike suggested with a tentative look. 

“Uh, no.  And Mrs. Hudson, our old landlady, didn’t have an address for him either.”  John’s voice was clipped, angry.  Then he flattened his hands in front of him.  “Sorry, Mike.  I’m so sorry.  I know you’re just trying to help.”

Mike shifted in his chair, but then seemed to make up his mind. “For what it’s worth and I’m not even sure you want to hear this….” He looked down into his mug; today they’d ordered in.  The coffee in Mike’s oversized ceramic mug shimmied as he blew on the hot liquid.  “Look, Molls, well, Molly knew it was only you for Sherlock.  She knew it even as she pined after him herself.” He looked up, meeting John’s gaze.  “So even before he ‘er ‘left’.”

John cleared his throat, his eyes now focused on his own coffee.  “Does anyone care what I think?”  He snapped his eyes up.  “I never saw it,” he protested. 

‘ _liar’_ his subconscious purred in his head. He amended the statement.  “I never saw anything in Sherlock that would have indicated he ever fancied anyone, let alone me.”

John was grateful when Mike didn’t ask the obvious question: _How did you feel about him?_

 

~~ooOoo~~

 

That was several weeks ago and now as the Eurostar pulled out of St. Pancras, John relaxed into the seat.  The three-day conference on paediatric ENT in Paris was a much welcome break.

The question Mike didn’t ask: how do you feel about Sherlock? circled round and round.   _‘like a teddy bear’_ his mind supplied.  Fabulous.  There was always something creepy whenever Sherlock, and now his subconscious, reverted to nursery rhymes to make his point. 

Still, what had Sherlock ever been but an overgrown four year old?

The train sped out of the overly populated outskirts of London, the lush green scenery flew by at over 185 miles per hour, and John closed his eyes suddenly feeling dizzy. 

Images of his former flat mate flashed though his mind:

Sherlock in a strop, flinging himself onto the couch, curled up in a foetal position, long bare feet making him look somehow vulnerable. 

Sherlock, manic as he deduced clues from a crime scene until they somehow coalesced into a solution only he could see.  

His mouth turned down into a sneer as he insulted one and all for their lack of intelligence.

Sherlock, dressed to the nines, heading out to some fancy dress party for a case involving an heiress who was being blackmailed.  God, how he’d looked in a tuxedo.  John remembered coming downstairs and his mouth dropping open.

Sherlock’s lip had half curled up in a smile at John’s expression and John remembered the flush that had burned on his cheeks.

 _‘so, not so oblivious to him, after all.’_ It wasn’t a question.

Finally, thankfully, John slipped into light sleep where his mind wasn’t grappling with his marriage, his relationship with Sherlock, or even what the future might hold on either topic.

He started awake as the train slowed, coming into Paris’ Gare du Nord.  He vaguely recalled half formed dreams full of inappropriately stored body parts and a skull mocking him from the mantle on their flat on Baker Street.

Stretching in his seat, John remembered some of the good times too: the chase through London on that first case, when Sherlock had made his point about the psychosomatic limp.  John’s heart had flooded with affection and gratitude for this oddly otherworldly man he’d only just met. 

He remembered the Chinese they’d had after he’d killed a man to save Sherlock’s life.  They’d continued to giggle like children over their egg drop soup and cashew chicken and beef & broccoli.  It was the first time John had seen Sherlock eat.  With no trace of anything other than entitlement, the world’s “only consulting detective” deftly reached over the table with chopsticks and stolen bits of broccoli from John’s plate.

The train glided to a stop and John stood, moving toward the exit, waiting until the doors opened before grabbing his overnight bag from the bag bin, and then hopped off the train. 

The weather was supposed to hold, and he wouldn’t mind a walk along the canal St-Martin.  The conference didn’t start until 7pm for a cocktail hour, so he had plenty of time.

Paris’ Gare du Nord Station was just like any other train station John had ever been in: newsagents, coffee shops, and people all in a hurry to get where they were headed, tourists and business people alike.

Like everyone else disembarking from the train, John headed up the platform at a quick step.

“Lestrade!” he heard a silky baritone call out.

John jerked his head.  It couldn’t be.  But he stopped, and looked around. 

And there he was:  Sherlock.  Standing off to the side, slouched against a column, his mouth in a smirk, he had his eyes focused into the crowd.  He looked good, his hair cut shorter in the back, but still curly on top, dressed, as always, in a bespoke suit.

Blood rushed to his face and John took two steps forward, his hand raised to call out to Sherlock, when he saw Greg finally break free of the crowd.  He moved straight into Sherlock’s personal space, and John stopped dead when he saw Sherlock reach down, lace his long fingers around the back of Greg’s head and pull him in for a kiss.

It wasn’t a buss on each cheek kiss.  It was the kind of kiss that would have had John – had it been anyone else – looking away because of the intimacy of it.

As he watched, Sherlock pulled back.  He was smiling, eyes shining.  There was affection and happiness written all over him.  It was a good look.

John felt tears well up in his own eyes. He brushed them away, his fingers less than gentle. 

Sherlock leaned back down, his face almost on top of Greg’s shoulder, lips moving as if he was sharing a secret.  John heard Greg’s laughter and then he gave Sherlock a gentle shove, and took a large rucksack out of Sherlock’s hand.  The pair turned to go.

Last chance, John thought.

But when he saw Sherlock slip his arm around Greg’s back and he once again saw Sherlock displaying his ‘real smile,’ the one John had always assumed was reserved for him and only him, he let his hand fall back to his side.

Somewhere between the brutal onslaught of blood and knuckles and his marriage to Mary, John gave up the right to Sherlock’s affections years ago.  And he had, as Mycroft had pointed out the last time they spoke, made his position quite clear.

He couldn’t say why his eyes continued to fill with moisture. Nor was he ready to ask why he felt an aching pain in his chest. And the even sharper one, like he’d been kicked in the stomach, he couldn’t even bear to think about.

Instead, he stood silently, watching the two men who had once made up the best part of his world, walk away, completely oblivious to his presence.

He remembered the feeling of loss and of hurt that he felt the day that his best friend leapt to his death.

And he was gutted. 

Once again.

_~Fin_

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> As per normal, I own nothing.
> 
> Many, many thanks to my wonderful beta L_Morgan. The story is better for your careful, thoughtful beta. XOXOXOX
> 
> To all who read this story: it is my attempt to wrap my mind around what the world will be like with John married to Mary. 
> 
> FYI - I'll be on holiday for the next two weeks with no access to email/internet. I'll respond to comments, questions or concerns at that time. Cheers. Jadis.


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